Perry Community School District Teacher Recognized by Secretary of State Paul D. Pate

Friday

Jun 30, 2017 at 9:29 AMJul 5, 2017 at 11:16 AM

Staff Report

Jolene Niemeyer was recognized by Iowa Secretary of State Paul Pate for organizing Perry Middle School’s participation in the statewide Iowa Youth Straw Poll for the 2016 general election. 8th grade students voted on their choice of the 2016 general election candidates.

The results were then totaled with results from other Iowa schools and reported on Secretary of State Paul D. Pate’s website: https://sos.iowa.gov/youth/poll/results.aspx

Jolene Niemeyer stepped up and registered to include our student’s voices in the statewide straw poll and as a result of their efforts, students received a unique civic education experience.

This was Niemeyer’s last year in the Perry Community School District. Niemeyer has been teaching at the Perry Community School District for 41 years, and will retire from her position of teaching 8th grade social studies.

“First of all, I thought it was really a fantastic thing for the state of Iowa that we had so many teachers interested and encouraged their students,” Niemeyer said. “Which is what I saw the value in.”

Because of the leadership from Iowa teachers like Jolene, the Iowa Straw Poll was nationally recognized this year, winning the National Association of State Boards of Education Award for Outstanding Leadership in Voter Education from the National Parent Student Mock Election. In Additionally, the social media aspect, #IAparticipate, was a national top 5 finalist for a Government Social Media Award.

Iowa Secretary of State Paul D. Pate sent Jolene a congratulatory certificate for her part in making the Iowa Youth Straw Poll nationally recognized.

“My thanks to all of the teachers and school administrator who helped make the Iowa Youth Straw Polls a huge success,” Paul Pate, Iowa Secretary of State said. “More than 250 schools and 56,000 students participated statewide. We could not have done this without the efforts of the teachers.

The Youth Straw Poll was a fun, hands-on learning experience for students across the state that hopefully will encourage them to become engaged in civics in their community.”

The Iowa Youth Straw Polls were the culmination of Caucus 101 and Elections 101.

Those are free, online, social studies curricula developed by Secretary Pate and written by Iowa teachers for Iowa students. They are available for anyone to use at Elections101.org.